Reviewing the work of the Supreme People's Court over the past year, President of the Supreme People's Court Xiao Yang said that the court faithfully performed its duties endowed by the Constitution and laws.

In 2000, the supreme court conducted second hearing, review of death sentences, and justice supervision involving 4,228 cases and wound up 4,832 cases, including those carried over from the previous year. Local courts handled 5.35 million cases of first hearing and wound up more than 5.38 million cases, including those carried over from the previous year. About 88 percent of the cases involved civil proceedings.

Courts at different levels adopted effective measures to solve the problem of difficulty in implementing the court verdicts, upholding the judicial authority, Xiao said.

Last year, Chinese courts sentenced more than 640,000 criminals, 6.21 percent more than in the preceding year. The courts also mete out due punishments on a tiny number of die-hards of Falun Gong cult for violating the law, fully demonstrating the seriousness of law, Xiao noted.

Over the past year, the supreme court made efforts to promote good style of work and ward off corruption by improving the quality and efficiency of adjudication, encouraging institutional renovation, carrying out judicial rescue and assistance, and ensuring impartiality in the administration of justice, and clearing out a small number of corrupted judicial personnel, according to Xiao.

Outlining the tasks for this year, Xiao Yang said that the courts will better employ the legal means to deal with criminal activities and dissolve social contradictions, get well prepared judicially for China's accession to the WTO, place the administration of justice in the service of promoting economic development, strengthen the enforcement of court decisions and ensure impartiality in the administration of justice, he said.

In his report on the work of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, President Han Zhubin reviewed the achievements of the Supreme People's Procuratorate in investigating and prosecuting major and serious corruption and bribery cases and cases involving dereliction of duty and the infringement of the right of person and democratic rights.

He told the NPC deputies that the procuratorates in the country investigated and prosecuted 45,113 bribery and malfeasance cases and recovered a direct economic loss of 4.7 billion yuan.

At the same time, he noted, the public prosecutorate organs across the country took an active part in the struggle against organized crimes and evil forces of under-world nature and in dealing with criminal activities of the evil Falun Gong cult and in specially organized anti-crime campaigns.

He said that the procuratorates approved 715,833 arrests and prosecuted 708,836 suspects.

Meanwhile, the procuratorates intensified efforts to oversee legal proceedings, seriously punished judicial and law-enforcement personnel for taking bribes and bending the law and for resorting to deception for personal gains, Han said.

He said that the procuratorates will intensify oversight and promote impartiality in law enforcement this year, with emphasis on investigating and preventing job-related crimes and intensifying oversight over legal proceedings so as to safeguard social stability.

He pledged to promote reforms in public prosecution and improve the quality of prosecutors, enhance the effectiveness of grassroots prosecuratorates, and raise the general level of the supreme prosecuratorial work.

A total of 2,747 deputies attended the plenum. Members of the Ninth CPPCC National Committee also attended as observers.

(Xinhua 03/10/2001)